On Belly Buttons, Jell-O, and Me As A Nurse

Last week was quite eventful. Besides the ginormous pile of never ending laundry, the potty training that isn’t quite sticking, two destination imagination meetings, karate practice, and a flu shot to a child deathly afraid of needles, we added another wrench in our week.

Davis had a double hernia surgery.



The week before he was complaining of a stomach ache and I was bracing for the inevitable projectile vomit that Hayden had experienced only a few days earlier.

But the vomit never came.

Only tears and tummy complaints that would come out of nowhere and disappear even faster.

One day Davis went to the nurse four times. He had no fever and no symptoms other than his “tummy hurting.” She called me each time he visited her and said I’m sending him back to class – just wanted to let you know. Finally on the fourth time, I think she was so beat down that she finally suggested I come get him.

We were both still a little skeptical, but I agreed to pick him up.

Background Information regarding The Boy Who Cried Wolf: It had only been a few months since we KNEW we were duped by Davis playing hooky from school. Back in September, my first month out of the working world, Davis moped into my room early one morning complaining of some ailment (I don’t even remember what).

Jeff and I were so elated that I was now a stay at home mom, thus we didn’t have to do the whole ‘who has the more important meetings today’ dance, we forgot to do our typical interrogation to make sure Davis was actually sick – and not playing hooky.

Fast forward a couple of hours - I walked down stairs to find Davis dancing and practicing "baseball slides" - Risky Business style in the living room.



 Davis was taken back to school by lunch that day.  Okay, so back to January….present time. Hopefully, based on the video above, you can understand my uncertainty in the whole situation. Finally on night two of these come and go symptoms, we pinpointed that the pain was coming from his belly button.

As soon as Jeff heard that, he knew Davis had a hernia – something Jeff also has dealt with for years. Jeff was so confident in his diagnosis that we skipped the obligatory (read: wasteful) pediatrician visit (you know where they confirm what you tell them and then send you to the next doctor that can actually do something about it).  We made an appointment with a pediatric surgeon – who as luck would have it – had an appointment the very next morning. The surgeon and I bonded quickly after he told me he had SIX boys and no girls. He took one look at Davis’ belly button and confirmed that he had not one, but two different kind of hernias. He also validated that the pain with hernias comes and goes and all the symptoms Davis had been experiencing were completely normal.

We scheduled what was described as a very minor outpatient surgery for the following Tuesday and when asked about how long it would take Davis to recover, he shrugged his shoulders and said – ‘oh that night he will feel fine – but we will let him take the next day off of school just in case.’ Which turned out to be a BIG FAT LIE.  Davis woke up from the surgery in so much pain. Crying out in pain. Refusing a perfectly good blue popsicle.

This is the part where I am going to refrain from venting about the anesthesiologist and nurse that sent us home after the required 45 minute recovery time was met – even though he was still saying his pain number was a 10. I had been asking him his “pain number” throughout the week before and it had never gotten above a 4-5….so I knew he was seriously hurting. I had to hold back the mama bear in me and not scream – WHY DO YOU KEEP ASKING HIM IF HE IS FEELING BETTER – BUT YOU ARE GOING TO SEND HIM HOME EVEN THOUGH HE IS TELLING YOU HE IS NOT!

That night he was not completely fine, as the doctor had suggested. Nor was he fine the next day. Or the next. In fact, over the course of the next three days, Davis would lay in bed, and refuse to get up for almost anything other than the bathroom. Over the course of the week, he watched the same movie on repeat twelve times.

TWELVE TIMES!

Not because I wouldn’t switch out the DVD, but because I think it required too much of his own energy to decide on another movie. Green Jell-o was delivered to him on a schedule more frequent than his Tylenol with Codeine. Sprite was at his beckon call. He was spoon fed fruit and cottage cheese. And then by day 3 he got used to all the pampering. And started to get a bit demanding. This is what being sick in the year 2013 looks like. (jelowe = jell-o).

I promise I wasn't texting in my nursing skills the WHOLE time - but I was just sick of watching that dang movie so I'd occasionaly do my "rounds" via text.

Then finally the weekend rolled around and things started looking up for sweet Davis. Although with Monday right around the corner, he knew he needed to plan ahead. One night while we were saying prayers, we talked about how he had a doctor’s note and he wasn’t going to have to participate in PE for two whole weeks – until he is completely recovered. He argued that he should probably just come home during PE time, because the section of the gym where the kids sit out is really stinky.  Then he moved on to his next requirement for going back to school.

He should probably go ahead and get a note for Music too. 

Because when he sings, he uses his stomach muscles and it was really going to hurt.

And that is when I knew – the argumentative-got-to-have-the-last-word Davis I know and love was back.  So today Davis is officially back in school after missing 6 out of the last 9 days.

 He’s still kind of walking like an old man from the stitches in his belly, but he’s there – and I’m here – eating left over jello.

*** Note: all the pictures of Davis above were taken BEFORE the surgery and AFTER the silly juice. A big thanks to Aunt Amy for the super-cute Build a Bear that definitely helped to brighten Davis's day.